Tag Archives: creative ideas

Take an ordinary deck of playing cards. Print the details of 52 unsolved crimes on the face of the cards. Distribute these decks of cards to all 515 police departments and sheriff offices within Minnesota, as well as 75 countywide jail and annex facilities. In addition, send over 10,000 decks to Minnesota state prison inmates. Wait for the tips to come in. And they are coming in.

The neat thing about this project is that it puts the information about these cold cases right into the faces of people who are most likely to be able to help catch a crook. Other crooks. This is a good example of targeting the proper market. Except in this example, the customer is not buying, they are selling… information.

This is a great example of a creative use of an everyday, ordinary product. One that we produce millions of every year. However, this is just one example of thousands of products that are used everyday carrying an important message. Maybe the next great idea will carry your message. We will never know until we try. How about we start today?

Summertime cook-outs, non-profit cook-offs & autumn tailgating are all great opportunities to advertise with an apron. After all, who wants to get sauce all over their party duds? No one! You can do them a big favor by providing the temporary cover they need to look the part of the cook, even if the results leave something to be desired.

Use an apron to tell your customers and prospects that you have them covered – literally.

Here is a bonus spin on this weird idea of the week. This fall, hundreds of grade school students are going to be painting, glueing and creating messes in art classes all over the area. Question: Would your local school appreciate some donated aprons to help keep their students clean? If your business has anything to do with children, art class aprons provide a wonderful opportunity to build brand awareness in an environment that builds credibility and good will.

Why be on the web? What is the value of a presence on Facebook or Twitter? To get an idea of what is going to be coming to a smart phone near you, take a look at this video from Engadget . In it you will get an idea of what local promotion will consist of in the not-to-distant future. Follow your viewing of the video by reading this article from Fast Company.

The short version of what this means to you. If you run a retail outlet or any other type of business which relies on having consumers finding you easily, you need to start working on your web presence now! Before we know it, consumers wanting to find anything they need will be consulting their phones before going anywhere. One of the primary sources of information for the applications these web-based phones are going to rely on are social networking sites and/or local web portal sites.

The shorter version of what this trend means to your business is this: If you aren’t planning on entering the world of social networking or investing in your web presence, you are planning on being out of business before you know it.